Buckfast Easter eggs popular

Handout photo taken with permission from the Facebook page of Derek Brennan of a Buckfast Easter egg package from D-Bees off-licence, in Lurgan, Co Armagh, which took more than 2,000 orders within 24 hours of advertising it according to owner Derek Brennan.

Published:14:41Sunday 26 March 2017

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A Lurgan off-licence has been flooded with orders for its tonic wine-themed Easter eggs.

D-Bees,took more than 2,000 orders within 24 hours of advertising a special Buckfast Easter egg package, according to owner Derek Brennan.

Mr Brennan, who has promoted novel “Bucky” products in the past, said the idea grew out of the shop’s “massively successful” Christmas and Valentine’s hampers.

The package includes a 140g chocolate egg with a miniature 5cl Buckfast bottle as well as a Buckfast-branded pen, lighter and magnet.

Mr Brennan said he has 20,000 eggs to sell and will ship all over Britain.

The Easter egg package costs £9.99 and will start selling online from April 3.

Buckfast Tonic Wine has been made by Benedictine monks at Buckfast Abbey in Devon for almost 100 years and is particularly popular in Scotland and both Northern and the Republic of Ireland.

The quasi-legendary drink has an alcohol content of 15% and the caffeine equivalent of about four coffees per 75cl bottle.

Known locally as ‘Lurgan Champagne’ it is frequently linked to violence and anti-social behaviour and in Scotland has nicknames like “wreck the hoose juice” and “commotion lotion”.

In 2015, the Scottish Prison Service found 43.4% of inmates had consumed Buckfast before their last offence despite it accounting for less than 1% of total alcohol sales nationally.